Q. What is the origin of circumcision?

A. What I heard from my shaykhs is that circumcision was begun
by our father Adam. It was a tax he imposed upon his body after
he committed his mistake, and Allah knows best. The Prophet
listed it among the Sunnas of the Prophets. Following are the
hadiths pertaining to this topic and the elaborations of our
Shaykhs.

HADITHS:

H1. Abu Hurayra reported from the Prophet (s) that he
said: "The characteristics of natural religion are five:
circumcision, removing pubic hair, clipping the mustache,
paring the nails, and plucking the hair under the
armpits." Muslim narrated it (Tahara Ch. 16 #50; English
1:159 #496).

H2. Ahmad ibn Hanbal relates in his "Musnad"
(5:75) from Abu al- Malih ibn `Usama's father that the
Prophet (s) said: "Circumcision is sunna for men and an
honorable quality for women."

Arabic: al-khitanu sunnatun li al-rijali makrumatun li
al-nisa'.

H3. From `A'isha: The Prophet (s) said: "If the two
circumcised parts (i.e. male and female genitals) have been
in touch with one another, ghusl (major ablution) is
necessary." Tirmidhi narrated it and said it is fair and
sound (hasan sahih -- Tahara #108-109). Also related by Ahmad
and Nisa'i. It has come through other narrators and in other
versions: see "Kashf al- khafa" under the hadith:
"idha iltaqa al-khitanan fa qad wajaba al-ghusl."

H4. From Anas ibn Malik: The Prophet (s) said to Umm
`Atiyya -- a circumciser of women in Madina: "When you
circumcise, let them smell the breeze and do not enfeeble
them (= remove very little and do not excise): it brings good
cheer to the face and benevolence for the spouse."
Haythami said in "Majma` al- zawa'id": Tabarani
narrated it in the "Awsat" with a fair (hasan)
chain of transmission. Abu Dawud relates it (Adab #167), also
Ibn Mindah and Ibn `Asakir (Tahdhib tarikh Dimashq) from
al-Dahhak ibn Qays, and Ibn al-Athir in "al-nihaya"
5:137 and Khatib al-Baghdadi through `Ali.

H5. One of the attributes of this Community is "the
Circumcised" according to the hadith in the first book
of Bukhari: " Ibn al- Nazur the (religious) head of
Eilat by appointment of Heraclius and bishop of the
Christians of Syria used to relate that one morning after
Heraclius had first come to Eilat he was seized by anxiety
and that some of his patricians said to him: "We see
that your countenance has changed for the worst." Ibn
al-Nazur continued: "Heraclius used to be a diviner who
gazed at the stars, so when they questioned him he replied to
them: "Last night as I gazed at the stars I saw that the
King of the Circumcised had appeared. Which of the nations
circumcise themselves?" They replied: "None but the
Jews, therefore do not let them worry you in any way. Write
to the cities of your kingdom and order them to exterminate
their Jewish populations." "As they were pondering
this a man sent by the king of Ghassan came to Heraclius with
information about Allah's Messenger (s). When Heraclius heard
his report he said: "Go and enquire: is he circumcised
or not?" They enquired and reported back to him that he
was. Asked about the Arabs as a whole, the informer said
again: "They practice circumcision." Heraclius
said: "Now has come the time for this nation to rule
(the world)."

COMMENTARIES:

C1. Imam Nawawi said (commenting on the hadith of Abu
Hurayra in Muslim): "Circumcision is obligatory (wajib)
according to al- Shafi`i and many of the scholars, sunna
according to Malik and the majority of them. It is further,
according to Shafi`i, equally obligatory for males and
females. As regards males it is obligatory to cut off the
whole prepuce or skin which covers the glans or head of the
penis, so that the latter is wholly denudated. As regards
females, it is obligatory to cut off a minute part of the
skin in the highest region of the genitals. The sound view in
our school (Shafi`i), which is shared by the large majority
of our companions, is that circumcision is allowed in a
youthful age but not obligatory (at that time). One view is
that the guardian must have the child circumcised before he
or she reaches puberty. Another view is that circumcision is
prohibited before the tenth year. The sound view according to
us, is that circumcision is desirable on the seventh day
after birth."

C2. Nuh Keller's Translation of al-Misri's "Reliance
of the Traveller" (Shafi`i school) p. 59:
"Circumcision is obligatory (Sh. `Umar Barakat: for both
men and women). For men it consists of removing the prepuce
from the penis, and for women, removing the prepuce (bazr) of
the clitoris (Keller: not the clitoris itself, as some
mistakenly assert). (Sh. `Abd al-Wakil Durubi: Hanbalis hold
that circumcision of women is not obligatory but sunna, while
Hanafis consider it a mere courtesy to the husband.)"

C3. Ibn Hajar said (commenting on the chapter-heading in
Bukhari, Ghusl ch. 28 #291; English 1:174, which is identical
with `A'isha's hadith in Tirmidhi): "What is meant by
the dual form in the phrase "the two circumcised
parts" is the circumcised genitals of the man and the
woman respectively. Male circumcision (khatn) is the removal
of the skin of the head or glans of the penis. Female
circumcision (khifad, khafd) is the removal of a tiny piece
of skin in the uppermost part of her genitals which resembles
the crest of a rooster, and between it and the entrance of
the penis there is a thin membrane" ("Fath
al-Bari" 1:520).

C4. It is obligatory for women neither in the Maliki
school nor in the Hanbali school. Both schools consider it
merely recommended. See Al-Qayrawani's "Risala" p.
161, 305; and "al- Mughni" 1:85. Ibn al-`Arabi
al-Maliki says in "Tuhfat al- ahwadhi" (1:167):
"_Khifad_ for the woman is like _khitan_ for the man and
consists in removing a piece of skin the size of a rooster's
crest in the uppermost region of the genitals on top of the
urine passage."

C5. Sayyid Sabiq, "Fiqh al-Sunna" 3 vols.
(Cairo: Dar al-Bayan li al-Turath, 1408/1987) 1:36:
"(The first of the features of natural religion [fitra]
is) circumcision. It is the removal of the skin which covers
the head or glans of the penis... As for the woman, it
consists in removing the upper part of the genitals [! Note:
this is incorrect, as shown in C1, C3, and C4]... The opinion
of the large majority of scholars is that it is obligatory
[this is incorrect, as shown in C1, C2, and C4]... Shawkani
said: "Nothing has been transmitted with regard to its
timing nor its obligatoriness.""

C6. The so-called "Sudanese circumcision" which
consists in removing the whole external genitalia, i.e. the
labia minora and majora together with the clitoris, is a
barbaric mutilation which has no basis in the shari`a
(Islamic law) whatsoever. Legal baselessness is also the case
for most cultural practices which revolve around the event of
circumcision, both male and female.

C7. The recent "Mu`jam lughat al-fuqara'"
(Arabic-English Dictionary of Legal Terminology" by Dr.
Muhammad Rawwas Qal`aji and Dr. Hamid Sadiq Qunaybi (Beirut:
Dar al-Nafa'is, 1985) p. 198 provides another illustration of
the misinformation being propagated on this topic. The Arabic
definition for "khafd al- mar'at" (women's
circumcision) is correctly given as: "Removal of the
uppermost skin at the top of her genitals" but the
English word given is: "Clitoridectomy," i.e.
ablation of the clitoris which is excision or mutilation, not
circumcision. Finally, many or most of those opposed to
female circumcision routinely refer to it as mutilation or
excision. And Allah knows best.